


Periscope

by aqhrodites



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Chance Meetings, Eventual Finn/Rey, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Mechanic Rey, Protective Poe Dameron, because everybody loves that shit, kind of like the soulmates concept but without the marks
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-11
Updated: 2017-06-11
Packaged: 2018-11-12 17:53:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,391
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11167008
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aqhrodites/pseuds/aqhrodites
Summary: Some things we need are right in front of us, though we may not see them immediately. That's why we have subtle tools, assistants that help guide to these things that are otherwise out of sight. Some call it destiny. Some call it fate, and others say coincidence; that's what Rey insisted it was when a hysterical pilot rushed in with a seeming broken droid.A story of fate and chance, of love and loss, of growth and second tries, played through the captured records of BB-8's memory cartridges.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **not sure how many parts there will be of this. maybe three or four. determines of how long the second part will come out to be when it’s completed and whether it would have to be split in half. i’m currently working on it right now.**

* * *

##  PER·i·SCOPE

**ˈperəˌskōp** / _noun_ /  an apparatus consisting of a tube attached to a set of mirrors or prisms, by which an observer (typically in a submerged submarine or behind a high obstacle) can see things that are otherwise out of sight.

* * *

 

_Cartridge 4448_

_Log: 07:28:14_

Aid, assist, preserve, alliance.

BB-8 begins its first operation, the one assignment its kind are made to do.

There’s a creature—human—a young man standing two feet away. He’s wearing a uniform. BB-8 is informed by the older, bigger, heavier human beside the other who is holding the clipboard that this younger human is its new partner. And the young man’s information is already in the small droid’s system, it finds: _Dameron, Poe. Parents: Kes and Shara Dameron. Species: Human. Age: 19. Birthdate: March 9th. Position is_ —

The droid is told that this is Dameron’s first assignment and fifth test out of the required fourteen, and that the BB unit has become his permanent partner, that it was to aid and protect Dameron at all costs.

It sees that this too is programed in its system.

The small droid coos, looks up the expanse of the young human Dameron’s jumpsuit, the helmet tucked securely under the bend of his arm, stubby 5 o'clock shadow darkening. The young man isn’t smiling.

* * *

_Log 16:48:24_

Dameron likes flying, and aircrafts—any kind of aircraft. F-22’s, fixed-wings, rotorcrafts.

BB-8 was there for his first bi-nary pilot testing and then his first active mission.

The human has difficulty with instructions, somewhat, and he had “winged-it,” as the human stated, on more than one occasion. BB has told Dameron that doing so was not a part of the protocol, that it was not something their superiors would look fondly on, that the calculations could bring them both to complete and utter devastation—the human smiles and pats BB’s head and calls it “cute.”

The human does prove to have what is called “luck;” he passes and becomes a skilled pilot in record time.

* * *

 

_Log 11:07:01_

Dameron likes to plant. BB observes him on his days off; on most days, the human Dameron can be found from sun up to sun down in the spare room tending to various forms of greenery, some he takes into the kitchen and cooks and eats. But Dameron doesn’t seem to know how to look after himself, and BB-8 has to remind him to do his laundry and to not let the dishes sit in the sink too long, and where the pest spray is to kill the critters that creep in afterward, and to not forget about the stove when he goes to “check on [insert vegetation here] for a quick second” that always turns into five minutes. A burner went up in flames once because of this—Sunday, on an October afternoon.

BB would whir “I told you so,” and Dameron would roll his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah.”

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4321_

_Log 10:12:24_

Dameron turns into a skilled pilot, having better hand-eye coordination than many others in the system, BB tells him one day after particularly disheartening news from a superior, a stretched woman named Deborah. Dameron then proceeded to a heated debate in the canteen with Matil Lumbar, another pilot. BB bleeps, telling of the statistically elevated percentage Dameron had in his profession, leaving Lumbar in the dust.

The human barely smiles, forces a twist at the corners of his mouth and grunts. He bites angrily at half of the energy bar he has left. He was on his way to answer to his superior now for the argument that broke out.

BB guesses that that is all the response it was going to get.

* * *

 

_Log 17:14:04_

Dameron misses his parents, but they’re voices through a machine now.

BB eavesdrops one day, unintentionally—it was in passing—and sees its human talking to voices emitting from a phone in the wall. Dameron is sitting at the end of a chair, facing away from the door and the hallway and BB-8. It was the morning they were to go onto a major mission.

The droid catches Dameron’s hand rise to his face. He sniffs. A female over the line gives him comforting words, his father sends words of good fortune.

It’s been almost two years since passing the test and climbing to be the fourth highest ranked flyer. And still BB-8 notices that before every mission, Dameron phones his home and it’s always the same thing—they talk, Dameron murmurs, words are exchanged, and its human would get suited up and BB would always watch just out of sight. Only this time was different—only this time—

Dameron spots BB. He jumps to his feet, lunges over to the walkway, and slams the door before the droid could finish its guilty explanation.

BB-8 is left screaming beeps through the door.

* * *

 

_Log 23:12:28_

Its human has difficulty expressing emotion and comprehensive thoughts in moments of stress, the droid notes. He’s gotten into an argument with a superior, almost gotten into fights if there hadn’t been a much-needed intervention, and had missed out on dessert that night and was too shy to ask the lunch servers for one.

But it’s night now and the quarters are dark and silent, and there’s the soft hum of the ship’s air system, and BB-8 goes over its logs of the past three week, wondering, rolling down the echoing hall—

“Go to sleep, will you?”

The droid pauses, turns. His human is looking at him, stomach down in his own bed, eyes unable to see far in the barely lit room.

“I can hear you all the way in here, and I can’t get to sleep with you _rolling_ up and down the place!” Dameron can _feel_ his fatigue, but because of this damn droid, he hadn’t been able to get a lick of sleep.

BB-8 beeps, telling that it wasn’t being _that_ loud.

Dameron insists, quite brashly, that it was.

The droid objects.

Eventually both come to a compromise. Dameron asks with forced politeness, “ _fine_. Can you _please_ just—continue whatever it is in the morning and just _plug yourself in_ your charging port?”

The droid rolls its head around as if giving a neck roll and bleeps sarcastically. But it goes over and inserts its charger to “sleep.”

Dameron gives an audible sigh and feels his eyes closing…

* * *

 

_Log 12:12:32_

The next time Dameron has a day off, BB-8 makes sure to have a talk about his attitude. They had just came from a market, and the taller was carrying two bags piled high of recently purchased groceries.

“What do you mean? I was not about to start another fight!”

BB clicks, “yes you were!”

“No I wasn’t. And there’s no way I would have said _anything_ like that to Diane. I’m not _Phillip_ ,” Poe snaps, adjusting his hold on the groceries.

BB whirls another comment.

True, his human wasn’t as vulgar as the one called Phillip, and that Dameron had been actively ready to get physical after defending Diane, but—

“And I am not _cowardly_!”

BB’s head rolls around, another neck roll.

“Look, I’m _complex_ , not shy.”

BB clicks, “sure.”

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4215_

_Log 14:11:38_

BB’s human is shaking, BB observes from a safe distance and zooming in its vision. His higher-up shouts again and the human to the right of Dameron puts their weapon down. Now it’s Dameron’s turn.

Poe holds a gun for the first time.

And he’s shaking, can’t seem to keep steady.

His higher-up shouts. Dameron flinches.

He shoots a gun for the first time. And he misses.

BB shakes its head, whirling sadly.

* * *

 

_Log 22:24:13_

“Five…four…three…two…”

Dameron hasn’t slept well in the past few weeks and BB realizes that it doesn’t do much with telling him this. The bags under his eyes have grown more apparent and his stubble is no longer a shadow. He’s going to have to shave before going back into work.

“…One.”

BB watches Poe Dameron blow out the single candle atop the large, extravagant cupcake that has to be held with two hands.

BB whistles, confused. His human has said that he doesn’t like chocolate and yet this three-inch high cupcake is made of nothing but it, a mixture of dark, milk, and white. But it was made from one of the bakers at Publix, a sweethearted older woman named Minnie who he regularly strikes up a conversation with and whom insisted the dessert and gave it to the pilot for half off upon finding out what day it was.

Dameron lifts the small cake from the tiny, stark white box and comments about its weight.

BB watches him take off a corner of dark frosting with a finger and brought it to his tongue, the sight automatically being recorded in another of the droid’s memory cartridges.

Dameron turns the cupcake around, slightly inspecting it and commenting on the decorations Minnie put into it, the white chocolate wafer sticks, dark chocolate curled shavings, and tiny edible crown. “Do you know how old I am today?”

The droid remains silent for a beat, calculating, then beeps its answer.

“Yup,” Dameron remarks. “Twenty-four. Twenty-four long, excruciating years.” He takes a tentative bite into the pastry, chews. It’s dark chocolate. He doesn’t grimace this time—it’s not bad actually. And there’s sprinkles.

He grins.

Dameron remembers that Minnie once told that her granddaughter likes sprinkles because _“they make everything happier.”_

Surprisingly, he eats the entire cake, a tribute to the maternal baker.

“Remind me to thank Minnie next time we go to get rutabagas,” he remarks, dusting his hands on his pants.

* * *

 

_Log 11:45:24—two days later_

But Minnie isn’t there.

“She’s been in the hospital all this weekend,” another baker, a college student named Darwin, tells. “Heard she had a heart attack.”

BB whistles dejectedly, then turns its head up to Poe’s and sees his hand clench around the wire metal handles of the grocery basket, the tightening of his jaw, the twitch in his eyes as they widen, appalled, petrified, frightened.

“Oh. …O-ok…”

BB-8 watches silently, the memory automatically being recorded and stored.

“Sorry man. You knew her?”

“Some…something like that…”

Poe and BB-8 get the rye bread they had come for and left. The rutabagas had all been bought. Poe doesn’t take out the thermos of soup he had brought for Minine until they return home. He eats it for dinner instead.

* * *

 

_Log 04:11:06_

Nothing to note happens.

BB’s human, Dameron, doesn’t talk much that following week. Currently, he’s getting ready for another getaway to work. He’s in front of the mirror, finally shaving the short beard that had grown. BB reminds him to get breakfast which he ultimately doesn’t.

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4207_

_Log 11:24:48_

There’s a flower shop four blocks from his apartment that Poe likes to go to. If he wakes up early and grabs his coffee on time, and if it’s sunny enough and he has enough change, he and BB-8 would take a walk.

Poe admits that he likes the bustle of people, a comforting change from the uniformed base back in D'Qar.

During these walks, Poe likes to talk. Sometimes BB responds, other times, this is being recorded in the background of its other running systems.

BB records the history of Poe Dameron’s parents, his schooling, of his father teasing him when he won seventh place at a plant-growing contest, of his first crush. That he slept with a nightlight until tenth grade, of his mother’s intoxicating perfume, his cousin’s telltale finger-wag inherited from his uncle. Of sitting in his mother’s lap as she took him on a flight in their small plane; the months he’d stay with an aunt or uncle due to his parents being away for work. Of the cat he and a neighbor friend, a friend who had been like a brother to him, found and hid it from their parents until dinnertime. Of the same cat being hit by a car. Of the tears shed and the small, makeshift funeral he, his friend, and their families held for the gray tabby. Of the cummerbunds that were too tight and the hand-me-down shoes that were a size too large, and the neighbor friend that moved away, and his first fistfight.

When they reach the flower shop, the talking usually stops. There’s an older, grey man who works behind the counter—Giorgio, as in Giorgio’s Flower Shop. Today, there is a girl working, a college student with crinkly brown curls for hair and dark hazel slits for eyes. This time, Poe cracks a half smile and walks up to the counter, beginning with a request for white lily flowers.

The girl informs that they were to get new ones next week and that she has a boyfriend.

Poe doesn’t come back for four weeks.

* * *

 

_Log 13:12:53_

BB doesn’t wake that morning. At first, Poe thinks that it’s another one of the droid’s tricks, of it being stubborn because he wouldn’t buy the automated radio in the store. He had went the entire morning without noticing; it was only after having breakfast and lounging around for thirty more additional minutes does he go and check on the droid because it was being _suspiciously quiet_.

Poe nudges it with a sock-clad foot, scolding it while holding a mug of Brazilian coffee, six sugars, and he frowns.

“Stop fucking around. I’ll turn you on myself if I have to.”

The short droid remains charged for twenty more minutes before Poe fulfills his threat. Heaving a sigh, he squats in front of the silent BB Unit. There are no lights or beeping indicating that it is active; the charging port glints green, signaling the droid is fully charged. Poe’s hands glide over the orange and white metal.

“Now, where’s your ON switch…”

It would take him five more minutes to find it. And by that time, Poe will realize that this was definitely not a trick, and he would panic, and wheel the bot to the nearest mechanic as fast as he could move while towing a twenty-seven pound droid.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **This chapter can go parallel with BB-8 staying with Rey in in TFA.**

 

_Log 14:43:58_

Poe has never struggled so much, ran so fast in his life.

BB-8 wouldn't turn on that afternoon, and reason enough, Poe panics.

Never has he lugged a twenty-seven pound hunk of metal across town in the heat of summer, and really, it's not something he would choose to do twice. But there are only two mechanics in the city who have practice with droids and one of them was currently closed for the excuse of "personal business."

Poe rushes through the twin glass doors and thinks he's close to having a heart attack and flops on the counter. He's out of breath and barely wheezes out an audible, "here for the 2:45 appointment made today!"

The man behind the counter, a thick, mustached brute, mercurial wipes his palms on his dark jeans that are stained from oil and grease, folds his arms and _huffs_. His eyes peer down his crooked nose to the silent droid at Poe's feet. His mustache twitches.

"Model?" It's all the mechanic musters and Poe's brows draw together.

"Uh," Poe pauses. "Astromech version R3DL. It's...kinda from—kind of from—from the Resistance Air Force."

The man is _taller_ as well as larger than him, the pilot notices, and shuffles on his feet. He realizes just how irrational he had been about his rushing.

The mechanic removes the frayed toothpick from his teeth. "The _Resistance_? Don't y'all have your own mechanic for that or something?"

Poe grinds his teeth. The man's name tag reads that this is the manager, Henry Wallowitz. Poe realizes his ill-thinking about all of this situation.

"Look, are you going to fix my droid or not?" It's spoken with more spite than intended. But the older, bulkier man looks the pilot up and down and gives a conclusive growl before agreeing.

* * *

 

_Log 17:48:59_

"Ponytails! Get out here! Got a new one for you."

A girl emerges from the back room of the auto repair shop and lifts the full-face welding mask that she's wearing. She is still holding the flameproof gloves and the top of her overalls are tied around her waist and marked by oil and singes from burns, and she has a slight limp in her left leg and a scowl to her face. Her hair is tied up into three vertical buns which had never really struck Wallowitz as _odd_ until mentioned by a customer.

"Need extra hands out here since Dale's gone." Wallowitz points her in the direction of the works that are in queue. "An astromech droid was dropped off this afternoon—from the _air force_ ," he adds sarcastically, with more enthusiasm than necessary. "Some pilot dropped it off earlier—"

By now, the girl—the young woman, actually, has taken off her helmet and abandons the gloves thrown behind the front counter. "And you want me to stay overnight to work on it?" she finishes.

Wallowitz is silent for a beat. "Only if you want to, ponytails. Otherwise—"

"No. I need the extra pay anyway," she looks to the door that reads EMPLOYEES ONLY, and he raises a brow.

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4187_

_Log 10:25:14_ _—nine days later_

"You're more trouble than I would have guessed." Rey slows her chewing and stares back at the droid at her feet. For the entirety of her lunch break, the thing's been watching her and recording and _staring_ at her, continuing so while she eats her sandwich. And it likes to _talk_ , she quickly found out, like now, as it beeps and whirls away in chatter.

The small droid was easy to fix enough. It's charging port had been damaged and it's battery held evidence of the start of corrosion—but that was an issue for another time when its owner comes back. The first thing Rey did, however, was fix its bent antenna, and she wonders if that was what prompted this onslaught of chatter.

And the droid's been staring at her and _following_ her everywhere like a lost puppy. It apparently has _feelings_ too. Ever since fixing its charging port, Rey made sure to record this and the droid's previous damages to its current recording cartridge. Rey had also found out that it didn't particularly like the dark and on every closing hour, it tries to _bargain_ with her before she leaves—every night it would try and convince her to take it home with her and every morning it was the first to welcome her, Wallowitz, and then Dale when he returned from his vacation.

"And no, I'm not taking you home tonight," Rey answers its bleeped try at persuasion.

The droid is energetic, to say the least, and as much as Rey doesn't like to admit it, the thing was starting to grow on her. It talks about a base at a place called D'Qar, of its owner and how he likes to sleep in and raise flowers and who almost burns their house down and who can never find his matching sock; about its master's "mean authorities," of adventures its been on which Rey highly disbelieves.

The droid is amusing to say the least, and would actively strike up a conversation with customers and give the employees a helping mechanical arm if needed, and was always sent out when they had to _operate_ on a machine.

It's been nine days after being repaired and Rey squats down to ask the droid where its owner is currently located. And BB-8 bleeps that he was probably on a mission because _there's no way Poe would have forgotten about ME!_

Her lips stretch into a line.

A mother of three comes in because her car breaks down after she dropped her kids at school. Wallowitz is out and Dale is on lunch so Rey is the one who comes to the front counter, the short droid rolling along her heel. She guesses from the woman's description that her battery just needs a jump and that the engine overheated, and then her eyes grow wide and she asks about the cost. Rey can't give her a solid answer.

The woman is about to fume when BB-8 chirps. And at first the woman is confused, and then stunned, and then is cooing over the cute droid. BB-8 swivels its head around to Rey as if questioning the other woman's sanity and whether it truly is "cute."

Rey only shrugs, chuckling silently.

She guesstimates that the woman's repairs would come to around $190 to $230 dollars.

Dale comes back and the two look at the vehicle. The estimated price of repairs comes to a total of $368.

The woman turns carnation pink but dishes out her credit card to the mechanic. Dale gives her thirty percent off out of generosity.

Twenty minutes before Rey closes up shop, BB-8 comes rolling after her. It lightly nudges her knees and looks up at her, large lens recording and she can tell that it's almost _pleading_. This time, Rey intently considers taking it with her. But Dale comes up behind her and shoos it to go charge itself and go on sleep mode.

* * *

 

_Log 10:09:12_

It's Veteran's Day and the mechanic shop is closed.

Rey's friend, Kiena, a young woman with crinkly brown curls for hair and dark hazel slits for eyes, is here for a visit. She's also taking up a part time at a local botanist store and Rey decides to drop by unannounced. She's dressed in a flowy red crop top and light-blue high-waisted jeans that are rolled at the ankles and dark shades atop her head, and Kiena claims that she hadn't been able to recognize the other at first, she jokes. Rey gives her a playful smack on the shoulder, and Kiena feigns pain, complimenting Rey's toned biceps.

"That mechanic place's doing you some good. You're not a stick anymore," Kiena jokes, eyeing the other. "I don't think I can push you around quite anymore, huh?"

Rey slides her sunglasses from her forehead to her nose. "You damn straight."

Kiena dips her fingers into the small, live bonsai tabletop fountain on the counter, and flicks droplets of water at her friend.

* * *

 

_Log 11:27:18_

It's Veteran's Day, and the mechanic shop is closed and Poe rakes his hands through his short dark hair and wonders why they didn't put _closed on holidays_ in their recorded voicemail. Poe pulls his forehead away from the glass window of the front door. He has to be back at D'Qar by next Thursday morning and will get his head _chewed off_ if he doesn't returned with his assigned droid.

He decides to return home, but on the way, veers toward Giorgio's after remembering that he has to replace the pot for his bonsai tree that's been living in his pasta bowl for the last three weeks, after being knocked over in a clumsy rush.

To his dismay, the same woman with the crinkly curls and sun kissed skin, whom he has actively avoiding, is behind the counter at the botanist shop. Poe dips his head and hopes that she doesn't remember his failed courting. He finds comfort in squeezing the bridge of his nose, chin down.

The bell chimes as the door opens and he enters. There's large Swiss cheese plants and sunflowers flanking the door frame and the first few shelves that Poe has to weave around before the front counter is in view. The young woman from before is talking to another in a red crop top leaning on the counter. Poe finds the aisle that holds the ceramic pots and fingers his wallet in his leather jacket pocket.

"...And there's this flower guy. He comes a lot, Giorgio says, though I never really see him," Kiena speaks that Poe overhears. She then goes on about an elder woman, another regular, who likes poinsettias and a teen boy who had bought a rose for Valentine's.

Poe finds a small white pot that has a single blue ring circling its white middle. It's plain, unpretentious. He brings it and a small bag of organic potting soil to the front counter.

The chatter immediately stops. The woman with the curls mentally switches into work-mode and brings the price-checker around to ring up Poe's items. The second woman in the crop top glances down, and Poe lingers on her peculiar hairstyle before she shuffles over to the side more. He flashes them both a smile.

"What's wrong Kiena? You can't lift up a bag of soil too?" Rey teases, splaying her fingers apart in a way that's teasing of her friend's pickiness about her manicure.

Kiena curls her fingers, hiding her two nails broken hat morning. "Never mind _her_ ," Kiena spits and Rey flashes a smug grin. "How are _you_ doing today, sir?"

Poe smiles politely and gives a routined reply, something about nothing special happening and the weather - something boring and monotone. His smile is forced, it's strained.

Kiena holds up a finger. It hovers for several seconds, her mouth open, thinking about her words first. "Haven't...haven't I seen you before?"

Poe swallows his tongue.

"You come here often, right? I believe I've seen you...or someone with your face..."

"Yeah, um..." Poe twists the hair above the base of his neck. "I do. Periodically."

Then Kiena smiles like a fox. "Yes, I believe so. When you came in looking for marigolds." Kiena tilts her head slightly. "Did you find your _special person_ yet?"

Poe's face falls and then lightens, astonished.

"What _special person_?" Rey asks, leaning her elbows across the granite countertop. Then she too smiles, getting the _indication_.

And Poe swallows, embarrassed, and then frowns. He claims that there isn't someone as such in his life. But afterwards, he smiles and tries to pass it off as being polite.

"Aw, c'mon, there's always _someone_. A guy like _you_ who just carries around flowers by himself? With no special _someone_?"

Poe wets his lips. The woman beside him is still leaning forward. Her red shirt is rising up her sides and exposing her belt and slit of ochre skin and the soles of her Adidas high tops are turned to the ceiling. She grins politely.

Poe claims that maybe if he finds that _one_ , then he will.

Kiena tisks, gives an "aw," and asks her friend for conformation on his "cuteness."

Rey gives Poe a once-over. "Yeah, I suppose so. He's pretty good-looking."

He clears his throat, scratches the space between his eyebrows, feels his cheeks beginning to heat.

Kiena asks if the soil and pot are all he is purchasing for the day.

Poe gives a polite nod of his head before handing over a MasterCard. He promptly dashes out the shop with a blended cameo pink flush of his ears that Kiena points out to her friend as the bell chimes at his departure.

"You two would look cute together."

Rey's neck whips around. She wrinkles her nose. Smiles. Scoffs.

* * *

 

_Log 9:38:12—one day later_

Poe had gotten a voicemail message left by his good friend Karé Kun reminding him to show up _promptly_ for their assessment in two days back at D'Qar.

He tries the right glass door to the mechanic/repair shop. The crumpled page that had a printed "CLOSED FOR THE HOLIDAY" in large, bold letters has been taken down.

Inside, there is no sign of the burly man from his check-in. A flatscreen television is mounted in a high corner in a secluded room he guesses is for customers; a rerun of Maury is playing. A half-empty water cooler dispenser emits a collection of bubbles once, twice. In the back he can hear the whirling of machines and the grating scratching of metal sharpening metal.

Poe grits his teeth, smooths down his jacket.

There is a small bell on the front counter. A tapped-over shred of paper in front of it reads to ring for service.

He rubs his hands together. He remembers the man from before, the manager—he had reminded Poe of a school-wide bully in fourth grade.

He rings twice. No answer but the continuous grinding of sharpening metal.

He rings three times.

Four.

The grating in the garage stops. The manager—Wazowski was his name?—doesn't emerge, and instead it is a pale man in a baseball cap. Poe adjusts his footing and is asked if he needs assistance or here for a scheduled appointment.

"Appointment. I, uh—" Poe rubs his hand across his chin. "—I'm here for the the nine-thirty appointment pick-up for a droid."

He's given a once look-over and a raised eyebrow before Dave saunters over to behind the front counter, thumbs through a blue three-inch binder. He scribbles something that Poe can't see. He holds up a finger to Poe before disappearing behind the door to the garage. Poe drums his fingers against the counter. In the waiting room, he hears that Maury has arrived with the DNA results of yet another child and their discordant parents. Just before Maury announces the results, the back door opens again. Poe leans a bit, squinting his eyes to try and hear over the clunking of her boots and jangling of whatever—what is it, _coins_?—in her overall pockets.

And she's quite noisy too. The way she pulls off her thick gloves and drops them on the desk, the light chewing of Spearmint gum that lingers in her trail for 0.2 seconds. Poe doesn't get to hear the results. The woman flops open the large blue binder and _noisily_ flips through the pages.

She's flipping to today's date. "What's your name, sir?"

"Dameron." He's still looking toward the waiting room like a child trying to catch the last glimpses of a tv show amidst a task.

"What are you hear for... _Dameron_." Her bandaged left finger finds his name scribbled on the fifth line down. "Droid," she remarks, at the same time Poe pats the counter, finally turning forward.

And he's...puzzled.

She blinks. And after an almost skeptical once-over, eyeing the emblem stitched on his jacket, she verifies, "you're here for a droid, right?"

He's silent.

Her brows raise, him swiveling back to meet her eyes.

"Um..." His tongue darts, wetting his bottom lip. "Yeah, yeah..."

"The droid? Here it says that you have an appointment to pick up a droid." She taps the pencil on the paper. Her brows draw together when he doesn't answer and just _stares_. "Is there a problem?"

"You had been at the flower shop two days ago, right?" She frowns deeper so he backtracks. "Sorry—I was just—just trying to figure out..."

"I do know the girl who works there. We're friends..." Her sentence drops off, questioning, analyzing.

Poe's gaze darts to the stitched-on name tag on her overalls. It reads only a simple name: _Rey_.

"Sorry, sorry. I didn't—"

"No," she interrupts. "I remember you." There's a hint of a grin and Poe grows relieved. "You were that guy who bought that organic soil. Kiena's told me about you."

"Oh?" He's flattered, more so that she so easily remembers him. Poe asks how.

"Because no one ever buys that brand."

_Oh._

There's a cheer heard from the television in the waiting room. Rey's pencil taps on a page in the binder, and the water tank bubbles. She wonders if she should have added that extra two coats of mascara today.

Rey writes a confirmation of his appointment. "He's not the father, you know. This episode. It's the third time they've played it these passed two weeks."

Poe stares forward with a subtle disheartened appearance. "oh."

Rey's smirk isn't really _concealed_. She checks him off, then orders him to stay as she returns back behind the door to the back. Inside a specific section are four droid, three deactivated. BB-8 is waiting by the door when Rey walks in and beeps loudly. Rey reads the details from the clipboard.

A _BB Unit_ , _Astromech version R3DL_. _Description: orange and white_.

She looks to the tall blue anthropomorphic droid against the wall. She turns to BB-8 rolling up to her ankle, chirping away.

Rey's shoulders slump.

The little droid bleeps a question.

She responds, "it looks like your partner's here for you."

The small droid gives a high-pitched squeal of glee, barreling past Rey. Like a puppy or small child, it rolls up to Poe, beeping and clicking.

"So this one is yours?"

"Yeah." Poe is knelt to BB's height. "He didn't give you any trouble he?"

Rey folds her arms across her stomach. "No. ...No, actually. Quite the opposite."

Poe looks up to her and Rey sighs, forces that straight-line grin. Her eyes linger.

"How long have you two known each other?"

Poe looks back to the astromech droid before patting its head. "For...um, just a long time." He passes a grin down at the droid. "He's my best bud. Been with me ever since I started flying."

BB-8 chirps in agreement.

"Yeah, he told that you were pilot. Of the squadron called Rapier."

Poe blinks. "Yeah, actually. Um..." He's surprised, really, and taken aback. His brows draw together. He wonders how much BB-8 told. He gives an appointed look down to the droid.

"That's cool." Rey shoves her hands in the deep pockets at the front of her overalls. "You know," and she shrugs, "since I do little flying myself."

"Really?"

Rey's smile is small, reserved.

Poe's right brow arches.

The man sticks out his hand. "Dameron... As you already knew that... Poe Dameron," he corrects.

She sees a ring on his second finger.

"Rey."

She shakes his hand.

* * *

 

_Log 9:23:14_

Poe Dameron and BB-8 arrived at the assessment in D'Qar _on time_ and with zero detectable differences or defects. There are around forty other pilots in the Rapier squadron.

His good friend Karé gives Poe a knowing look and hands him a cup of coffee one early morning when looking like death. Poe practically spits out the drink and then wrinkles his nose and glares down at the stale, likely re-brewed coffee in his mug, and she mocks him as high-class and a princess, only joking.

Every morning Poe slides on his special brown jacket and goes to training on the days he isn't in the gym. But most days he adorns a cinnabar-orange jumpsuit uniform for all pilots of Resistance Air Force. Because most times, the men and women are behind the wheel, journeying into enemy territory. And there have been many times Poe has come close, so close to capture. BB-8 would calculate his statistics of coming back alive. Not all of them were positive. In fact, most of them weren't.

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4009_

_Log 11:47:23_

"You want to go visit her? What, you've known her for, like, two weeks!"

BB bleeps back a protest.

"Yeah well two weeks isn't long enough time to know someone."

BB snaps that it has kept that relationship alive longer than Poe had kept a cactus plant from dying.

"Yeah well...!"

He doesn't have a protest, he knows, and sighs, groans in defeat. Currently they are exiting a Starbucks, somewhere near Main Street. He's ordered a plain frozen vanilla mocha frappuccino, blended, with double shots of espresso. There's apparently been a pottery store that opened up and one of Poe's fellow pilots and friend's birthday is approaching.

BB-8 whirls. It continues talking about that woman, about how she's such a good friend of its, how she ad helped the droid so; it's so much praise of _Rey this_ and _Rey that_. Until, finally, Poe caves in and honestly curious to meet this "amazing" Rey.

BB pleads to see her again before they have to return to D'Qar.

Poe gives in.

* * *

 

Rey is used to the quiet.

Silence is peaceful, and it's calming, allowing her to think and concentrate. It's the ticking of the clock, the soft rain pelting the window sill, and a restful night's sleep. It's the soft glow of the tv at night, and a bowl of warm soup, a face mask on and her hair unkept and ugly.

She's used to the privacy and the silence. When the HomePop chairs empty, the sun blaring down, her skin burning, tanning, the rain pattering and echoing off the walls of her small flat. She's used to the quiet, silence, and the lonely; the yellow rays of the sun peeking through her window blinds, heavy, gritty fingers of exhaustion day in and out. She's grown satisfied of the lesser noise, the bone-deep and vaguely tender solitude; she likes that there is only one toothbrush, one coffee mug in her cupboard, exactly one pair of house slippers and bathrobe that she wears for an hour right after showering, not bothering to cover up.

Rey has learned to take pride in her loneliness.

She wakes, makes a quick breakfast of a microwaveable biscuit and milk. On a shelf sits a small hand-sown pilot doll from her youth. She doesn't remember where she found it. There is exactly two photographs hanging on her living room walls, both with lens flares and taken at poor angles, but she's comforted by them anyway. She has gone to the local art fair that happens exactly twice a year, and has at least one abstract painted canvas hanging in each room.

She drinks decaf coffee when she goes in for work, completing a shift that is from morning to night. She'll wave goodnight, goodbye, and return to her small one-story flat with a single couch and beanbag chair in the living room. She'll fall asleep with the tv on, used dinner plate on her single bedside table, and lie draped across the sheets of her bed. Her flat is silent and could easily hear the stray cats pattering outside.

It's comforting. It's undisturbed. It's private. Recently, she's begun missing that small, talkative droid.

Rey has become tired of the quiet.

* * *

 

_Log 14:14:09_

It's two in the afternoon when BB-8 returns to the repair shop, rushing inside with Poe trailing after.

And it's just the ends of a sudden appointment rush from college students returning from Spring Break when the glass door swings open and he lobby is filled with enthusiastic chirping. The droid has become an the honorary Little Brother of the mechanics, and is welcomed with a lilt from Dale—and then the other notices the pilot sidling in silently. BB explains its business and to not pay Poe any mind though the plot is still given a raises eyebrow and a curt, gruff scoff, and is told to wait in the lobby as he goes into the back.

There's a mother and two children in the customer waiting area. The pilot leans his elbow against the counter, begins flipping through the magazine left there. He's already attentive about this about his poor ability to argue _no_ , and is particularly missing that mushroom stroganoff left in the frigerator. He's watchful and unassertive, an ink spot against a polished marble floor; he feels out of place and intruding—because he's seeing the woman from before emerge from he garage with oil stain decorating her overall pants, and suddenly there's a tightening of his windpipe and Poe chokes, stutters, coughs. Dale is smirking, silently instigating. And it's annoying, of course, especially since Poe's dressed with a periodic table-printed on the front of the t-shirt he's deep cleaned his kitchen for the last time he's won it—but it could be worse. The woman— _Rey_ , she'd spoken, _I'm Rey_ —could have given a sneer, a condensing swipe of her eyes.

Her footsteps falter when she sees them, slows but proceeds with caution upon noticing the droid chirp and begin rolling to her direction.

Poe leans both elbows against the front counter. BB-8 chirps away excitedly to the woman who has bent down to his eye level.

She's giving a closed-lipped smile. Poe runs a hand down his jaw, picks up a mechanical magazine that is missing its cover; he's grown a thin shadow of stubble. BB-8 chatters away with the woman who is still very mysterious to Poe, and who is feeling very much the third wheel.

Either way, it's on an otherwise uneventful Friday afternoon in mid-April that Poe finds himself waiting out of line at a mechanic store, mentally steadying himself for the downright emasculating task of coming face to face with the woman he first met behind the counter. Suddenly, though—

There's a shift change.

Tall, slender woman with sun-burned tanned skin and dust-brown hair pulled into three buns is tying the thin belt around her waist, impatiently looking up to scan the lobby.

Her eyes pass over Poe. Pauses. Narrow slightly, as if in recognition. BB chirps at her side. It calls for the pilot's attention.

And then she's staring so ferociously— _still_ at Poe—that he fidgets with the pages of the magazine, folding the edges into dog ears, tearing the straight-edge top and bottom. He glances to the waiting area.

When BB screeches his attention, the woman— _Rey, her name is Rey_ —shots the droid a quick, doubtful glance before taking a pointed step forward. It's out of personal space. It's intolerable. It's intruding. It's intimidating.

"What," he says aloud, vaguely suspicious, vaguely cautious, lowering the magazine.

"I was told that you're a pilot. BB-8 speaks very fondly of you." Rey bites the inside of her cheek, voice daunt and harmonious and unfairly _lovely_ , really. "We don't get many pilots here, actually, so. I imagine that it's truly exciting. Sorry. BB talked about you a lot. Said you were a hero—"

Poe snorts. His forefinger runs along the creased spine of the magazine. "Nah. Nothing like that. BB just over exaggerates," he smiles in good nature.

The droid beeps, offended.

Poe holds in a chuckle, turns back to Rey. He winks. "He's just trying to impress you." And his hands find the keys within the pockets of his cargo pants.

When Rey's eyes widen and blinks, blinks, is _shocked_ , Poe thinks he's beginning to see the fondness BB holds about her.

" _Me_? _Why_?"

The pilot shrugs.

And then she's frowning curiously, turns around to the rolling droid behind. "Hey. You."

And then she's scowling so ferociously— _still_ at Poe, what the _fuck_ —that the mother in the waiting area, who looks like she smells of fresh ink and Target and off-brand, cheap perfume, the mother who shoots them a quick, doubtful glance before pointed shifting in her chair forward. Poe sees this out of his peripheral vision.

"What," BB chirps loudly, vaguely scandalized, vaguely in feigned innocence.

* * *

 

There's a heat wave the week Rey gets a call from her boss.

She's sprawled out in a cherry-red Adirondack chair in her small dining room. The curtains are pulled back. All the fans in her flat are cranked up to _high_. Her sunglasses are perched on the very end of her nose, her hair is pushed back from her face with a wide denim headband, and her bracelets' smooth silver ball chains—ceramic block letters that spell out 'Rey' strung through—are warm against her skin. She's in a bathing suit, a bright yellow two-piece she stolel back from an old roommate, and sweat is beginning to slide down the nape of her neck and settle between her collarbones.

The air is still, hazy with humidity, and the sun is so hot that it's blurry around the edges when she tries to look up at it. She cools with a handheld fan bought from a Dollar Store. The A/C is broken.

This is her day off.

"What's up?" Rey speaks into the phone cradled between her cheek and shoulder. Dale is on the other end.

"I have a question for you." he asks her, keeping his voice soft.

Rey squints at the grey cobblestone countertops, the freckles on the bridge of her nose almost apparent from the glow of her overheated skin.

"You know that guy with the orange droid? BB-something? From last month?"

Rey nods, remembers he couldn't see her. "Yeah. It was weird, right? Like something out of a weird dance video, or a man's cologne commercial." She grimaces to herself.

"Well, you'd probably not going to like this then," he says quietly.

"Oh...? So—"

"So you've gotten a visit from pretty boy. He's quite persistent. Or rather, his droid is. And—I just don't...I don't think the droid'll handle it well. Especially not after what happened last time."

"It'll be fine," Rey assures.

Her mouth twists, and a mosquito lazily swoops in to buzz around her window; she swats at it, misses, and then swats at it again

"You sure? You two were pretty close at the shop."

Rey assures.

Dale snorts. "Ok. But I still can't imagine the lil' fella alright with this."

* * *

 

By the time Rey returns to work, she doesn't receive a letter, a message, nothing from BB. Expecting the droid to return like its track records indicate, she waits patiently.

She waits three days. A week. Three weeks.

She daydreams, becomes curious, imagining about BB-8 and its curious, fascinating pilot partner; imagines that places they might have gone and the people met.

Rey waits a month for BB-8 to return.

When she sees a news report about the First Order fascist militia group kidnapping and enslaving people of towns invaded, the Resistance Air Force one of the reinforcements sent, Rey concludes tat the two must have been called back.

* * *

 

She isn't wrong.

* * *

 

At the Air Force cafeteria, Poe thumbs through a catalog magazine, munching on a lukewarm ham sandwich.

A tray falls to the table across from him, startling him slightly to see Karé sitting in the empty seat.

"How've you been?"

"BB's still mad at me."

"For?"

Poe sighs. He bites aggressively into his sandwich. Doesn't answer right away, continues to read the magazine.

"Why are you eating angry?" Her head tilts, and an eyebrow raises in question. "And since when have you been into...the mechanics of _AT-ATs_? Poe, _really_?!"

His dark eyebrow arches as she squares his shoulder. Sits straighter. Intakes a breath. "There's this woman BB met. A mechanic. I'd be fine with it if—if it didn't _shut up_ about—" He cuts off. What he was going to say was something he shouldn't, especially about someone he doesn't know. "It's always going on about _Rey's great this_ and _Rey's great at that_." Poe takes a drink from his water bottle.

Karé takes this pause to speak. "Sounds like a little jealousy...am I right?"

Poe gives a questioning stare. Shakes his head. Speaks around the rim of his water bottle. "Nah. Cant be jealous about someone I don't even know. That's stupid."

Karé's lips quiver. Poe can't tell if it had been at the start of a smile or sneer. "Stupid? It's possible—and you know that, Poe."

He rolls his eyes.

"Now," she stabs into a cut piece of Salisbury steak. "Tell me about this _grand mechanic lady_ that has _the_ Poe Dameron quivering in his boots. Does she breath fire? Can bench press twenty more than you? Has better Jordans than you do?" Her words are said in a joking manner but she is honestly curious.

Capping the top of his bottle, Poe slides the magazine across the table. He points at an advertisement picture of a government droid. There's a coffee mug ring permanent on the table top.

"She fixes things like _these_. And said that she's worked on small planes in the past—BB-8 said."

"Wow! Doesn't seem far off from your X-wing fighter. You think she could?" Then a thought hits her. "You think she can fly?"

To be honest, that wasn't a thought—why ask a _mechanic_ that, especially one he doesn't plan to see again—because there can't be _another_ time he would bring BB-8 in, as that would surely arise red flags and him be reprimanded nubby his higher-ups.

Poe shrugs. "BB says her birthday is coming up. It wants to visit her then.'

* * *

 

 

_Cartridge 4008_

_Log 9:01:04_

There's word about an enemy, of a fleet that a select few from The Resistance have been sent off to spy on has already happened. Poe and his team are told that they will be called on if things go down and force be needed.

They're told that the First Order, the opposing militia, has been on a rampage of murder, imprisoning, and kidnapping, wiping out towns and cities and leaving them as nothing but ghost places. There have been piles of charred corpses, remnants of car bombs on record, of dried pools of blood tired on the pavements, abandoned baby dolls and toys and child shoes.

This investigation has been going on for months.

Poe is told that they have a spy currently on base. All on base are to remain; all others have been called to return to the base, in case a war breaks out.

Poe does up in his orange flyer suit, helmet tucked in the crook of his elbow.

BB-8 gives whirs—sometimes in comments, sometimes in protest.

It won't make it back in time for Rey's birthday.

* * *

 

On her twenty-second birthday, Rey spends it with a take-out box of a steak dinner from Dragonfly and Franzia Shiraz wine bought from Target. It's raining. A repair man came over a month ago and fixed her A/C. Master Chef is playing on the television.

Her landlord, a large, pink man, had left a passive aggressive letter on her door in response to complaints about loud loitering outside the doors. She'll have to send a reply to correct him, again, that it was the neighbors and their guests.

On her windowsill is a small feeder for squirrels. Inside, is a small dollar store-bought dried up potted plant she'll have to remember to toss out.

It's nearly two in the morning when she gets a text message. It's a reminder to buy more tampons and ice cream.

She drinks the entire bottle.

She awakes with a mild hangover.

**Author's Note:**

> **If this fic is liked enough, I'll likely continue it.**
> 
>  
> 
> **Kudos don't tell much so _please_ let me know your thoughts! Was it bad and crappy? Was it too long and obnoxious? Was it just ok? Don't hold back your words, please! _Don't_ forget to comment. _Or_ , shoot me a complain and/or critic. Any words, good or bad, are greatly appreciated.**


End file.
